Biblical Hebrew Forum

[MarianneLuban AT aol.com]

In a message dated 8/17/2004 6:33:40 AM Pacific Daylight Time, 
peterkirk AT qaya.org writes:


> > Rohl, however, maintains that mainstream archaeologists are in error, 
> > Joshua's conquests are to be dated to the end of Middle Bronze II
> 
> is in itself in error. Rohl argues this point at some length (p.311 in 
> my edition of "A Test of Time") and agrees with "Kempinski [who] has 
> thus argued that Jericho fell soon after, or during, the reign of King 
> Sheshi, some considerable time before the end of the Middle Bronze Age". 
> (Reference to A. Kempinski, "Syrien und Palästina (Kanaan) in der 
> letzten Phase der Mittelbronze IIB-Zeit (1650-1570 v. chr.)", Wiesbaden, 
> 1983, pp.69-74.)

When Kathleen Kenyon re-excavated Jericho in the 1950's, she found that the 
13th Century destruction layer, estimated by an earlier digger, John 
Garstang, 
was actually a Middle Bronze destruction dating to ca. 1560 BCE.  Kenyon 
concluded that Jericho lay abandoned through much of the Bronze Age, with 
only a 
small occupation existing from around 1400-1300 BCE, most probably an 
unwalled 
settlement, the Middle Bronze Age walls having become useless.

Peter, the theory of Rohl that *the* exodus took place during the time of the 
13th Dynasty is just untenable.  It is based on the name of a pharaoh, 
rendered in Greek as "Chenephres".  What Rohl doesn't tell--or perhaps didn't 
even 
know--is that those parties, Artapanus, Eusebius and Bar Hebraeus, who tell 
this particular version of an exodus--do not, themselves, place it that 
early.  
Since I have done considerable research on this, myself, I can tell you that 
this version specifies that the two co-regents, "Chenephres" and 
"Palmenothes", 
existed 430 years after Abraham.  If one dates Abraham leaving Ur by the 
estimation of the fall of Ur as a city, which is 2000 BCE.  King Khaneferre 
Sobekhotep reigned 1730-1720 BCE.  The math doesn't tally.
And what about "Palmenothes"?  Rohl simply stated that nobody knows of any 
pharaoh by this name.  The heck they don't!  "Palmenothes" is just a 
Hellenized 
rendering of "pn ImnHtp", or the month of "Phamenoth", the month ultimately 
named after the deified king Amenhotep I, he and his mother, 
Ahmose-Nefertari, 
being considered great saints in ancient Egypt.  This Amenhotep reigned ca 
1551-1524 BCE and, for a time, had a co-regent, Akheperkare Thutmose I, who 
eventually succeeded him--but was no son of his.  After a short sole reign, 
this 
last was succeeded by his son, Akheperenre Thutmose II.  Probably, this is 
where 
the name "Chenephres" derives--the signs in the prenomina of these last two 
kings.  There is no "nefer" there, but only a "khefer"--because the Egyptian 
/p/ 
was really a "pf"--as in the German term "Pfennig" (penny).  AND these same 
historians that tell this story maintain that an exodus did not actually 
occur 
430 years after Abraham (which puts them at odds with some other ancient 
historians, but in the year 490 BCE--sixty years later--in the reign of a 
certain 
"Achencheres"--the same name that occurs more than once in Manetho's 18th 
Dynasty.  That is why Syncellus the Monk, who gave us Eusebius' version of 
that 
dynasty, makes the remark that Moses must have been quite young in 430 
BCE--if 60 
years later he conducted an exodus.  Regardless "Achencheres" is definitely th
e pharaoh of the exodus according to these writers--and not "Chenephres".  
That is what Rohl didn't reveal in his desperation to find a rationale for an 
exodus occurring within the 13th Dynasty--a dynasty that more likely saw 
Joseph 
than Moses.